Tuesday 17 January 2012 12.06 EST
First published on Tuesday 17 January 2012 12.06 EST

José Manuel Barroso has announced that the European Union has started legal action against Hungary in an attempt to force the country to revise the measures it recently introduced. For those who consider this a radical step, it's worth remembering what exactly the ruling Fidesz party has done since it came to power.

Since the April 2010 elections, a political tsunami has swept over the country. The existing regulations and institutions were dismantled and loyal Fidesz appointees were installed in leading positions, implementing the party's policies from economics to the judiciary, from the health system to municipal government, from education to the arts. More than 300 laws and regulations were hastily created (or modified) and pushed through parliament, many of which the deputies did not even have time to read before voting. Opposition parties have been reduced to a walk-on role.

Viktor Orbán's regime combines the extreme centralisation of economic assets (including the expropriation of the private pension funds, of several public foundations and the forthcoming centralisation of the municipal government's assets) and the monopolisation of power in a single party that intends to dominate every aspect of social and private life, turning citizens into subjects. The improvised nature of many of the new laws creates a wide margin for arbitrary decisions that increase dependence and insecurity.

In addition to a frontal attack on civil liberties, the government has redistributed economic assets (particularly through the tax system and investment allocations) in favour of interest groups close to Fidesz and a restricted layer of the well-to-do. This group zealously defends the party's power and executes its guidelines.

At the same time – through the unilateral rewriting of the labour code, the restriction of union action and collective bargaining rights, the radical dismantling of social welfare nets and independent social care institutions – the government exposed the most vulnerable social groups (the poor, the unemployed, Roma, pensioners, sick and handicapped) to the unfolding economic crisis. Life is precarious for those who live on wages and have no reserves or additional revenue.

By 2012, Hungarians had to realise that their dreams of 1989 – freedom and decent living – had fallen into pieces. No wonder they are disillusioned.

The world's leading newspapers reported on the massive protests against Fidesz's policies in Hungary in recent months, including an approximately 70,000 strong rally in front of the Budapest opera house, where the system's dignitaries held a sumptuous gala to celebrate the entry into vigour of the new "basic law", or constitution, and related laws.

While many in the world saw the images of a cheerful crowd of young and old, well dressed and poor, workers and intellectuals, demanding the departure of Orbán and the dismantling of his system, the average Hungarian who watches public television and reads journals close to the government learnt that heterogeneous groups of idealists, misguided and those who lost power gathered in front of the opera house shouting chaotic slogans.

In harmony with the government's media law, there were several waves of large-scale purging both at public TV and radio and there is only one independent-minded TV channel and one independent radio station left in Hungary. The latter, Klubradio, already lost its right to broadcast as of March 2012. Independent newspapers and magazines struggle for survival, due to the reorganisation of subsidies and the massive abandon of their former clients for advertising who are afraid to do business with them.

Of course, there is no question of silencing dissent; Klubradio was unable to meet the tender criteria set by the state media authority; those on hunger strike at public TV were dismissed for failing their duties and not because they protested against the manipulation of the news; the system's critics are visited by tax auditors and political opponents are examined for economic wrongdoing in order to ensure transparency, people lose their jobs due to administrative changes and not their political views.

As is customary in authoritarian regimes, the system's ears are sharp and its arms are long; people think twice before signing a petition, a newspaper article or taking part in public actions where they can be identified. Against this background, the large demonstrations of the last few months, as well as multiplying manifestations of civil courage, have an extraordinary value.

According to a recent poll by Szonda Ipsos, the number of Fidesz voters has declined from 34% early last year to 18%, but due to the new election law, the redrawing of election districts and the reshaping of key public posts, only a very wide coalition of political forces would be able to win the 2014 elections and start to reconstruct the country.

In addition to the present parliamentary opposition, this coalition would possibly unite today's civil movements that at some point would have to turn themselves into political parties and a moderate conservative formation the contours of which are still invisible, since Orban holds his party with an iron-fist and strives to monopolise the voice of the right wing.

In addition to Fidesz, this would-be coalition will have to face the extreme right Jobbik, which has benefited both from Fidesz's mistakes and the weaknesses of its political opposition and solidified its support base.

Since 2002, when Fidesz started its fight to regain power from the socialists, it tolerated and encouraged the extreme right. Once in government, in spite of some public clashes, it made several significant gestures towards the far right. In October Budapest's mayor named two representatives of the extreme right to direct a theatre, Uj Szinhaz, discarding the proposal of the present director.

Today's actions by the EU shows that the union has learnt from the fiasco of Austria's 2000 boycott. However, the issues that the EU singled out are the tip of the iceberg. The removal of judges over 62 and the ombudsman for data protection is part of measures that dismantle the state of law and include a thorough remodelling of the judiciary system from the supervision of the judges to the changed status of the constitutional court.

The attack on the independence of the central bank comes together with new economic legislation, which changed the status of major economic institutions such as the monetary council and gave the government free hand to execute its disastrous economic policy. The laws on religion and media are part of the comprehensive brain-washing exercise that stretches from the renaming of the streets to the overall reform of the education system. These are just some aspects of the machine Fidesz constructed in order to stay in power for decades.

Confronted with an avalanche of external critics, tough negotiations with the IMF and the EU's move, the government declared to be ready to negotiate just about everything. It is to be seen whether this is just a manoeuvre to gain time and access to badly needed financial injections. Up until now, the government has either bluntly rejected external criticism as "interference in its internal affairs" or made cosmetic changes and minor concessions, without touching the essence of its policies.

According to interviews he gave in recent days to his Hungarian public, Orbán "has not yet heard any reasonable advice on economics". Reacting to the EU's criticism, he said that "if there are sound reasons to change the legislation the government is ready to modify, but for the time being these are mostly political views that one can not do much about".

One of the speakers of the 2 January rally said: "We are Europeans. We believe in European values." She certainly did not call for replacing Fidesz-imposed austerity with a Greek-style austerity package. She meant a community of people based on genuine representative democracy, sustainable and equitable development and fundamental human rights; the Europe we all wanted to belong to in 1989. That Europe, and not only that of a common market, should continue to respond to the challenge Hungary represents today, firmly insisting on respect for its fundamental laws and norms. By helping Hungarians to rebuild a free, just and prosperous country, Europe can confirm its funding principles and start to envisage new models worthy of dreaming about.